Why I Don’t Hate Kim Kardashian

Hello everybody, and welcome back to Common Culture after a little pause for spring break! I had a wonderful week of not catching up on sleep and instead catching up on all the papers and projects I have due right after break! Now that we’re back, let’s jump right into a topic that most people will probably think is in generally the same area as homework-over-spring-break on the Things That Suck Scale – Kim Kardashian!

I know what you’re thinking: “Dayna, we’ve been reading your blogs, and you’ve been posting about some generally fun stuff, I thought you weren’t going to stoop to shallow pop culture topics like Kim Kardashian!”

Or maybe I’m just assuming you’re thinking that, because that’s what I thought when I initially considered the idea for this blog post. As a person who likes to consider herself generally intelligent and interested in things that matter, I usually give Kim Kardashian a pretty small sliver of my attention. However, this blog is going to be less focused on “Kim Kardashian dyed her hair; Kim Kardashian had a baby with a ridiculous name; Kim Kardashian is crying over something” and more focused on her as an icon.

I mean, really, why is Kim Kardashian famous? First and foremost, we probably all know her from her less glamorous past – am I talking about the sex tape or her position as Paris Hilton’s footstool? No one knows! The truth is that all celebrities have “less glamorous pasts” – things they did that nobody considered glamorous enough to pay attention to. Then one day, they did something more glamorous, and bam, people cared! We have to remember that Kim got herself a reality tv show, and producers don’t give shows to just anyone. There’s achievement number 1.

Since the tv show, Kim has done company endorsements, lines of clothing, fragrances and cosmetics, some acting, some singing, some modeling, wrote an autobiography and even produced her own show. There are achievements 2-10, and I’m sure I missed some because, even though people like to act like it’s not true, Kim Kardashian has quite an extensive list of accomplishments. Most recently, Kim and her fiancé, some unknown guy named Kanye West, landed a cover on Vogue – a decision that received a lot of backlash because landing a Vogue cover is an extremely prestigious honor that many believe Kim didn’t deserve.

It seems to me that the people who claim this have not traced Kim’s stepping stones to where she is now. Of course, I think Vogue covers should go to models that have worked their whole lives for something like that to happen for them. But I don’t believe that Kim hasn’t worked her whole life to get to where she is. No, she’s not a model, but Kim Kardashian is a hardworking entrepreneur who has earned her success.

Okay, let’s discuss the elephant in the room: “But Dayna, Kim is only famous because she made a sex tape!” Yes, I know, and here’s my opinion: lots of people have sex. Lots of people make sex tapes. Sometimes the tapes are released and sometimes they aren’t. But the point is I think it’s time we stopped focusing on what people do and don’t share of their lives in the bedroom and start focusing on what differences these people make in the world. I don’t care what Kim Kardashian did in a sex tape. I know that she is worth a ton of money that she’s worked for; she’s started many business ventures, and she supports many charities and organizations.

The important thing is that when a person becomes a celebrity, it doesn’t matter how they did it. That’s not how media works. If a person does something to launch them into the public eye, no matter what it is, they are there and they will be watched. If what we see of Kim after she’s on our radar is something we don’t personally like, we have every right to not watch her; not buy her magazines. But let’s put to rest the notion that Kim hasn’t worked to get to where she is or that she’s “not really famous”. Because every action she’s taken in her life, whether or not we agree with it, has led her to become a very wealthy, successful, prominent business woman. And I don’t know about you guys, but in my opinion, that makes her deserving of a bit of praise.

Hello! My name is Dayna. I am a second year student here at BSU, working toward a degree in Theatre Arts with a Dramatic Writing emphasis! My interests lie in writing plays, screenplays and fiction! I also love The Bachelor, In n Out animal fries and Harry Potter! Thanks for reading my blog. :)